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AFLW 2024 - Round 10 - Chat, game threads, injury lists, team lineups and more.
Training 2024 Pre-Season
- Thread starter SteeleSaints
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I put that down to the mids and half backs pumping the ball in terribly and predictably. Not the forwards fault and furthers the point that the improvement needs to come from the mids especially.
I love Max but you are right. He is the focal point and seems to not like moving more than 10 metres before he flies for the ball. Makes us easy to defend and he is always in the dangerous space making it congested.
gringo2011
Premium Platinum
It's impossible to make 2023 representative of our best set up. We were a cobbled together forward line with a guy who'd never played a game of VFL footy as our main spearhead, a couple of kids and a few stragglers. Lyon also in his first year in charge. We should be better drilled have more available talent and a better midfield to feed them.
The return of King in the 2nd half didn't hulp much, they just fell back into bad habits.
Sounds like Ross is well aware of it...
gringo2011
Premium Platinum
King was good when he came back and off a less than ideal build up. Owens, Coops, Phillipou, Hammer are all a year older. Membrey should get a decent run and Snags looks the right age to become a gun. I'm not too worried about the forward line.
I'm not worried about the personnel either, just the execution..
SteeleSaints
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Totally agree.
Its a simplictic view to believe the forwards were the sole reason for our lack of scoring. Our lack of scoring was more about how far up the ground our forwards had to compress because our midfield were getting flogged and the defence was under the pump. Hill was basically a full time mid starting at HFF, most of the time we struggled to maintain 1 stay at home forward. If that was King the opposition just double teamed him, which makes it tough to win the ball or lock it in.
The fix is to start having our mids win first use of the ball and to not have to constantly push so far into defence. The next is to have dominant marking defenders ala Darcy Moore who marks everything that comes near him. Howard's spoiling keeps the ball alive and a lot of the time still ends up with them scoring.
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Doogs is, and would be far better suited to play CHB and fulfill that need. Unfortunately for him we don't have a proper FB and our CHB is far too small to swap with him. Not really his fault.
We'll see if he's still on our list next year anyway. Something will give.
hayes
Brownlow Medallist
We were also a very slow, careful, sideways ball movement team. I’m more worried about how it gets in there rather than who’s down there.
SteeleSaints
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Every side wants to maintain possession, we had to go slow and sideways because there was no one ahead of the ball. So if we win the majority of clearances our forwards can keep their structure and the ball movement will automatically correct itself.
Desperate saint
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Leave someone on the forward 50 at all times -so there is somewhere/someone to kick it to.
gringo2011
Premium Platinum
The midfield was a much bigger issue to me. The forwards were good for what we had available and maximised what we had at hand. Dow and Henry give ready made replacements and that's before any of the youth push in. To me that will make a huge difference.
gringo2011
Premium Platinum
I think the defence was miserly and again, pressure builds when the contest is lost further up the ground. At the start of the season we were looking great as a defensive unit but broke open when exposed as the midfield got battered. Especially Steele playing hurt. Pretty much the whole of the midfield centred on Crouch for a lot of the year. That Brisbane game and the GWS final made us look very thin on talent around the ball. I think we have fixed it somewhat but you can never have too much talent in the middle.
Lovely long left foot kick.
Got BOG in one of his first few games.
Injuries got him mostly I think, but I probably overrated him tbh. Picked him up from Dandenong if I remember.
paddygunner
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Son of Dees premiership captain Barry- top bloke who still supports the saints!
Mowman
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Yep good player
Had lots of foot issues
Come over from Dandenong with Chris Hollow maybe Sean Ralphsmith too
The good sides controls the midfield (win contested ball CLEANLY); use outside / overlap run to pin point the ball to leading forwards or at least create an even number contest. We can’t win the ball as cleanly due to personnel/poor skills, fumble, fumble, fumble and long bomb as a result. That’s why winning contested ball / spread from stoppages are super important to clean forward entries, hope with Dow, an injury free Steele, Crouch, Jones and Henry can really change things up and improve our game this year.
Had a quick look this morning.
Crouchy and Jones running laps strongly, Arie steadily. Max doing bits in the DFC.
On the ground, Henry found plenty of space, Pou was getting involved in the guts and Dougal butchered it in the back half a couple of times. Paton looked like he was running on ball, might just be for lack of numbers. The Irish guy was in there too I think.
Crouchy and Jones running laps strongly, Arie steadily. Max doing bits in the DFC.
On the ground, Henry found plenty of space, Pou was getting involved in the guts and Dougal butchered it in the back half a couple of times. Paton looked like he was running on ball, might just be for lack of numbers. The Irish guy was in there too I think.
paddygunner
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Thanks for the update
caminiti with the main group?
Imtellingya
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Yes Caminiti with the main group
CaptainRisky
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He had 32 disposals in his second game
I think the "fix the midfield and the forward line will sort itself out" is very shallow thinking and will have us in trouble. It might even make our midfield look worse than they are.
No doubt we have focused on the midfield. Put a huge emphasis into this area in recruitment, development, and coaching. I just hope the same level of focus is placed on the forwardline.
No good having midfielders streaming forward with King trying to body a gorilla FB one on one. No good having Higgins as your primary lead up target. No good bringing the ball to ground and everyone has gone up for the mark. No good having your two key forwards leading into the same space. These are all the things we saw last year. Intercept defenders read our attacks better than we did.
Our midfield gap is about talent, run and spread. But the forward line is about structure, space, patterns.
Banking on returning talent and midfielders fixing our forward issues is going to result in failure.
I'm just not seeing enough focus on this in the training footage/reports.
No doubt we have focused on the midfield. Put a huge emphasis into this area in recruitment, development, and coaching. I just hope the same level of focus is placed on the forwardline.
No good having midfielders streaming forward with King trying to body a gorilla FB one on one. No good having Higgins as your primary lead up target. No good bringing the ball to ground and everyone has gone up for the mark. No good having your two key forwards leading into the same space. These are all the things we saw last year. Intercept defenders read our attacks better than we did.
Our midfield gap is about talent, run and spread. But the forward line is about structure, space, patterns.
Banking on returning talent and midfielders fixing our forward issues is going to result in failure.
I'm just not seeing enough focus on this in the training footage/reports.
